


Color Me Surprised

by RansomNotes



Series: Happy Steve Bingo [5]
Category: Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Colors, Happy Steve Bingo, Love Confessions, M/M, Magic, Requited Love, Spells & Enchantments
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-05
Updated: 2019-12-05
Packaged: 2021-02-24 16:14:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21680770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RansomNotes/pseuds/RansomNotes
Summary: Happy Steve Bingo 2019Amora the Enchantress fumbles a spell that affects how the Avengers see each other, with fascinating results...
Relationships: Clint Barton/Phil Coulson, Jane Foster/Thor, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Series: Happy Steve Bingo [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1561972
Comments: 3
Kudos: 151
Collections: Happy Steve Bingo 2019





	Color Me Surprised

**Author's Note:**

> Please note, Natasha Romanov/Bruce Banner is not a ship in this story.
> 
> (I do, however, ship Darcy with absolutely anyone.)

The floor shifted underneath them, and the lights swirled into some kaleidoscope of colors, spots behind his eyelids as he blinked.

He felt Iron Man grip his arm tightly as they stumbled, and Thor was yelling in the background. To be fair, Thor was often yelling in the background.

Amora the Enchantress had appeared outside the Avengers Tower a week ago today, swirls of green power twining around her, and pronounced some spell before disappearing. Thor had been yelling then, too, and he railed against her ill-gotten power and her cowardice for some time before calming enough to explain that she had evidently come to lure Thor away from his “alien” paramour, Dr. Jane Foster, who was Midgardian and not Asgardian, and thus, utterly unworthy. She had tried to sway Thor before, with “her treacherous feminine wiles,” Thor had spat, angrily, and it had led into a brief digression about whether Thor meant to term all femininity treacherous (he did not) or whether he found her specific use of it treacherous (he certainly did).

Back on track, he continued with the story, that he had proclaimed his love and fidelity to Jane, and Amora had disappeared, incensed. This too, had been interrupted, with questions about whether incensed anger has any particular smell of incense, if it’s a magical anger, since “incense itself is supposed to be pretty magical, right?” 

Steve had grown increasingly impatient with all the trivial rabbit trails, but eventually they’d reached the heart of the matter: this time, Amora had cast some sort of spell dooming Thor’s alien love to change to be as alien in his eyes as she truly was.

As per usual, with magical spells -- and, yep, here was Tony’s requisite rant about how infuriating magic was to deal with -- but anyway, the magic had somehow encompassed the entire group present. Tony usually would’ve opened his faceplate by now, once a threat vanished, but he was especially nervous about magic, and wouldn’t always take off any part of the suit until significantly after a magical encounter.

“But what does ‘alien appearance’ even mean?” Clint had demanded, and Tony swung for a few low hanging fruit with jokes about Clint’s everyday appearance, but everyone else looked around uncomfortably, worried.

Thor had called Jane, and she was on her way, but in the meantime, the area around and between the Avengers shimmered and sparkled in rainbow hues, and it was beautiful and menacing in equal parts.

When Jane exited the elevator, Thor gasped. “My star-crossing love, your skin-- your eyes! All of different shades!”

She’d stepped closer and held her hand just touching his face, trembling. “Thor, what’s happening? Why are you red, your eyes are red!”

Everyone else looked around at each other, dumbfounded.

Tony said, “I hate to stumble into an Emperor’s New Clothes situation here, not that either of you should feel bad about going naked, I mean, bravo on your fitness regimes, but, uhh, am I the only one that thinks they both look exactly the same as they always did?”

Everyone agreed, they looked unchanged to everyone else. 

Tony had turned to look at Steve, probably for some offhand comment, but he froze, his arm raised awkwardly. “Steve, are you--- Does Steve look any different to anyone else?”

Everyone said Steve looked the same, too, and Tony awkwardly admitted that Steve looked blue-eyed to him.

“But Steve’s always had blue eyes, right?” Clint asked, and only when Bruce started to agree and pursue the question did Tony admit that Steve’s entire body seemed blue-ish. Blue-toned, somehow. Steve looked down, perplexed, at his own arms, still pale-skin-toned to his own eyes, and shrugged nervously at everyone else.

Coulson had received the enemy alert as well as the all-clear right afterward, so he finally arrived after having agents double-checking the perimeter and confirming Amora was evidently gone. He’d just walked in when both he and Clint pulled guns on each other, and everyone started yelling.

Natasha immediately stepped between. “Steady, steady, hey, okay, boys.” She looked around the room, brow furrowed, and then said, “Coulson, Amora placed a spell where only some of us see each other a different color. Some sort of alien appearance spell. Does Clint look different to you?”

Coulson tightly answered back, “You can damn well see he does, Nat. He’s purple. Not that that’s entirely unprecedented, that’s exactly the sort of stupid prank he’d stumble into to, but it’s...shifting, or shimmery, or something. Unnatural. Unreal.”

Clint looked like he really wanted to agree about looking incredibly unreal, baby, but instead he tersely agreed that Coulson was shimmery and unreal as well.

Bruce was adjusting his glasses and rubbing the bridge of his nose, confused.  “So, only some of us see each other differently. And everyone else sees everyone the same as they always were. What are we missing here, what’s happening?”

Nat had stepped over to Coulson to push his gun down gently.

“I think-- I think it’s love.”

Everyone looked at her, befuddled. Nat was the last person expected to wax rhapsodic about love, after all.

“I think Amora’s spell is affecting how loved ones see each other.”

Jane’s friend and lab assistant Darcy had been tucked away in the corner munching cereal during all of this, mostly unphased, apparently from the trial by fire her friendship with Thor had included for magic and unreality, but she piped up. “Could be auras.”

Everyone wheeled on her in various shades of puzzlement. “Ya know, you see each other’s true aura or something. Like, the color of the energy surrounding ‘em, that sort of thing. Auras are always described all Lisa Frank sparkly pretty, aren’t they?”

Steve noticed that Tony had backed up and shut up as the conversation progressed, and he suddenly realized. He looked at Tony’s glowing faceplate eyes, and Tony quickly looked away. Without meaning to, he said out loud, “You love me?”

Tony flinched at the question, and then waved a hand too wide and intense. “Nope, nah, so see, must be some other explanation. But good guess about the auras, Miss Cleo, now what do we do about them?”

Darcy shrugged. “I dunno. I remember something about balancing auras, but-- ha, well, doesn’t seem to bother Jane and Big Guy anymore.”

Everyone looked at Jane and Thor, and immediately looked away again, as they were now frantically making out against the wall.

“Alright, well, that doesn’t prove anything about the magic,” Bruce pointed out, wearily. “They do that all the time.” 

Darcy nodded, aggrieved. “They really do. They’re just the worst roommates in the world, man.”

Tony looked at her. “Roommates? You don’t live here!”

She widened her eyes comically and nodded awkwardly. “Uhh, definitely don’t, just, umm, guessing they would be, with how they’re always all over each other.” Then her eyebrows lifted too. “Hey, Jane, Jane, catch a breath real quick! What color is Thor now?” 

Jane barely extricated herself from Thor’s feverish embrace and said, dreamily, “What color is he?  _ Mine. _ ”

It was a confusing answer, but she looked so happy, no one objected when she went right back to trying to swallow Thor’s tongue, and vice versa.

Nat looked around the room again, and quietly grabbed Clint’s hand and tugged him over to shake hands with Coulson. They were intensely awkward and stand-offish about the whole thing, until suddenly they both looked dreamy and impossibly happy, too, gazing deep into each other’s eyes.

“I guess the auras, I dunno, fuse or somethin’? Maybe? Not sure what this was meant to teach us, but then again, Thor’s said Amora doesn’t always manage the results she wants.”

Bruce said, “So, wait, Clint and Coulson? They’re in love, is that what this means?”

Both Clint and Coulson sputtered out some convoluted misdirection, but Nat just nodded. “Oh, yeah. Big time. Actually, it’s about time they ever said something. I thought I’d left the piney forests behind when I defected, but they’ve both been pining for each other for years now.”

Steve heard the quiet clunk of the elevator opening, and whirled around to see Tony getting in. He rushed over and slipped into the elevator as it closed, even as he heard Bruce whisper, “Oh, yikes, and Tony saw Steve different colors, but Steve didn’t see him differently…”

The elevator slid shut and went down to Tony’s workshop, and Tony might as well have actually been a robot or a statue. Steve couldn’t even hear him breathing.

“Tony, could you maybe-- could you take off the helmet?”

He didn’t reply, just stayed frozen woodenly in place.

“Tony, c’mon, please?”

The elevator opened to the workshop and Tony stumbled out like a damaged puppet, lurching to a stop with the metal knees locked.

Steve said, quietly, but with intensity. “I’d really like to see your face while I say this, Tony, but--”

Tony hastily interrupted, still turned away. “No need to say anything more, this won’t affect anything, I’m a professional, you know that, I’ve kept this to myself all this time. I had no intention of making you uncomfortable, Cap.”

Steve exhaled heavily. “ _ All this time?!” _

Tony flinched again in the suit. “And the hits keep coming. Look, Cap, this isn’t a big deal, it’s totally unimportant, I can be a professional, if you can just overlook this.”

Steve circled around to stand in front of him, but giving him plenty of space.

“There’s no universe in which I just overlook this. It’s a very big deal. Critically important. But please, Tony, please, just take off the helmet. I need to see your face.”

Tony was hunched in on himself, visibly pained. 

“Please, Tony, take off the helmet. I want to see what you look like, because--- because I’ve loved you for a long time, too.”

Tony looked at him, shocked, and almost robotically clicked off the mask. Steve smiled wide, so bright and so shimmery blue. 

“I always thought you sparkled, Tony, but I thought it was all in my head before! Can I...can I touch you?”

Steve had started tugging his gloves off as he asked, and Tony hastily stepped out of the suit. They carefully held each other’s hand, like an intense business handshake, and Tony slid his other hand onto Steve’s forearm. Steve flexed his hand and carefully touched his fingertips against Tony’s face. 

They both laughed, in relief and joy, as the colors started to blend and glimmer all around them.

Tony laughed again, weakly. “God, I hate magic. But I really do love you, Ca-- Steve.”

Steve pulled him into a tight hug, breathless and happy.

Back on the top floor, Nat quietly asked Jarvis if everything was okay downstairs. Jarvis hesitated a long moment before answering, checking in with Tony.

“Sir says everything is perfect, and asks, if he places a repulsor boot outside the workshop door, will everyone recognize it as a sock on the doorknob symbol?”


End file.
